Spiced potato cake with mint raita

Spiced potato cake with mint raita

This is one dish that you can happily serve to everyone – a bit different, delicious and vegetarian

Difficulty and servings

Moderately easy

Serves 6

Preparation and cooking times

Preparation time

Prep 40 mins

Cook time

Cook 45 - 50 mins

Vegetarian Freezable

Vegetarian

Method

  1. Put half the potatoes in a large pan of cold water and bring to the boil. Add the remaining potatoes and simmer for 12 mins until just tender (boiling the potatoes like this will mean that some will be more cooked than others). Drain, then dice.
  2. Meanwhile, melt 85g/3oz of the butter in a large pan and fry the cumin, fennel and nigella seeds until they start to crackle. Stir in the ginger and onions, then cook for 10 mins, stirring frequently until the onions are tender.
  3. Stir in the turmeric, ground coriander and chillies, cook for a min, then add the potatoes and cook, turning them in the from the turmeric. Take off the heat. Chop half the coriander leaves and add to the potatoes, along with a heaped tsp salt, the peas and lime juice. Stir well and set aside.
  4. Melt the remaining butter. Line the base and sides of a greased 23cm clip-sided or loose-based cake tin with filo pastry, brushing each sheet generously with melted butter as you lay them, butter-side down, in the tin - build up several layers so that the pastry is an even thickness all over. Allow plenty of excess pastry to hang over the tin. Put the spinach in the microwave and cook according to the pack instructions. Squeeze out all the excess juice and season.
  5. Tip half the potato filling into the tin, pack down, then cover with the spinach. Top with the remaining filling, then fold over the excess pastry to cover the filling, brush with more butter and scatter with nigella seeds. You can now chill the pie overnight if you want to get ahead.
  6. To serve: Heat oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Bake for 45-50 mins until golden and crispy. Meanwhile, tip the yogurt, coconut cream and remaining coriander into a food processor with the mint sauce and some seasoning, and whizz until smooth. Serve with a green salad tossed with chopped bananas coated in lime juice, finely chopped red onion and a handful of sugar-coated cashews.
Try

Filo pastry

Some brands of filo pastry can be quite heavily dusted with flour, which makes it quite dry when baked. It's simple to avoid this - just brush it off with a soft bristle pastry brush before buttering.

Per serving

611 kcalories, protein 17g, carbohydrate 70g, fat 31 g, saturated fat 19g, fibre 6g, sugar 10g, salt 1.5 g

Recipe from Good Food magazine, March 2007.

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Latest comments and suggestions

  • Binder photo sheila

    13 December 2007

    sheila rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    i followed the recipe first time,it was absolutely LOVELY and deceptively easy, but the second time, i put in a layer of spicy minced lamb, cooked with cumin and harissa. its hard to say which was more popular. truck loads of brownie points for me!

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  • Binder photo zoe boniface

    17 January 2008

    zoe boniface commented on this recipe

    What a fabulous centre piece this was at a dinner party I had. I served this as a starter and aswell as the yoghurt based dip I made the apricot blatjang out of feb 08 good good magazine, perfect! Looks impressive and tastes fab. A must do.

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  • Binder photo Erlik27

    22 January 2008

    Erlik27 rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    One of my best ever recipes. Have made half a dozen times and am always asked for thr recipe! Equally good (mebbe more so) cold. The coconut and youghurt sauce is essential. WE are quite big eaters, but I found that it served more than 6.

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  • Binder photo Louise

    28 February 2008

    Louise rated and commented on this recipe

    4 stars

    The filling was lovely and tasted very authentic. I really want to enjoy filo pastry but i'm always dissappointed with it. Next time I will add lots more spinach and serve as saag aloo

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  • Binder photo tanyah

    07 February 2009

    tanyah rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    This is such a good looking dish as well as tasting lovely. It is also pretty foolproof although time consuming - just make sure the potatoes are cooked thoroughly before dicing.

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  • Binder photo angmunchkin

    05 May 2009

    angmunchkin rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    I am NOT exaggerating when I say "this is out of this world!". It's surprisingly and deceivingly easy to make too. Nigella seeds look so fab sprinkled on top. I scaled the recipe to make one portion, and used a rosti ring as a mould; simply lift the ring off and there it is. (I cut a strip of non-stick baking sheet to fit exactly inside the mould as well.) I dry-roasted the cumin, fennel, and coriander seeds, then crushed them with pestle and mortar before adding to the pan. This releases the aromas. I could have diced my potatoes up a bit smaller to make it more of a "cake" consistency, but other than that, fab!

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  • Binder photo ilyank

    10 July 2009

    ilyank rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    be careful not to overcook the potatoes before you dice them as they will ultimately be twice cooked! This recipe looked and tasted delightful in my mums mothers day feast. I added a filo lattice and love hearts shaped from filo to decorate it. I didn't have onion seeds so I added some garam masala and curry powder, I also let the potato and spice mixture rest overnight in the fridge and I felt this helped develope its subtle, spicy flavour.

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  • Binder photo chez

    06 July 2011

    chez rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Made this for a family meal and it went down a storm. I didn't use the spinach or peas and I used a light french pastry instead of filo pastry. Will definitely make this again!

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  • Binder photo clarita

    04 August 2011

    clarita rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    when i made this, everyone loved it. the mint sauce was a really good accompaniment. i used rachel's organic greek style yoghurt with coconut - this meant i didn't have to also buy coconut cream, so was less hassle and also tasted lovely

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  • Binder photo Ma Mite

    08 September 2011

    Ma Mite rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    I've made this twice now. The first time I brought it into the office and it was demolished very quickly! I kept the second one for home. We've had it hot and cold and it works equally well either way. The tip above using Rachel's Yogurt with Coconut was excellent too.

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Difficulty and servings

Moderately easy

Serves 6

Preparation and cooking times

Preparation time

Prep 40 mins

Cook time

Cook 45 - 50 mins

Vegetarian Freezable

Vegetarian

A vegetarian choice everyone will love

Ingredients

  • 1.3kg medium potatoes , peeled and halved
  • 125g butter
  • 1 tbsp cumin seeds
  • 2 tsp fennel seeds
  • 1 tsp nigella seeds (onion seeds)
  • 2 thumb-size pieces of fresh ginger , peeled and finely shredded
  • 2 onions , halved and thinly sliced
  • 1 heaped tsp ground turmeric
  • 1 heaped tsp ground coriander
  • 1 heaped tsp ground coriander
  • 4-5 fresh green chilli , deseeded and sliced
  • 2 x 15g packs fresh coriander
  • 200g frozen peas
  • juice of 1 large lime
  • 200g filo pastry
  • 200g pack baby spinach
  • 500g Greek yogurt
  • 4 tbsp coconut cream
  • 2 tbsp mint sauce
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Per serving

611 kcalories, protein 17g, carbohydrate 70g, fat 31 g, saturated fat 19g, fibre 6g, sugar 10g, salt 1.5 g

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